I coordinate NRDC's work on renewable energy--fuels and power--and policies that will advance them. For the last few years, I've spent the lion's share of my time working on biofuels, biopower, wind, solar, and geothermal. Along with a great team from our land, water, oceans, and climate programs, I try to understand what these technologies are capable of, what are the research, development, and economic challenges standing in their way, and what standards we need to put in place to make sure they really deliver the environmental benefits they promise. I went to Brown undergrad and Berkeley for my masters. I have just enough science, engineering, and economics to be dangerous and use this training to translate the cutting edge energy technology developments into policy recommendations

Renewable electricity standards in 28 states and the District of Columbia are driving the build-out of an impressive amount of renewable energy--more than 51 gigawatts of pollution-free power installations between 1998 and 2013 alone. (Just to give you a sense...continued→

Improved wind power technologies already widely used in Europe--taller turbine towers of 110 meters and more, and more powerful rotors--can cost-effectively open up huge swaths of the country to wind power development. That's the great news out in a new...continued→

Start spreading the news: The world is now deploying more renewable energy in the production of electricity--more wind and solar power, in particular--than it is fossil fuels. And it has been since 2013, according to the analysts at Bloomberg New...continued→

There's a lot of excellent news out in the report the U.S. Department of Energy released last Thursday about the benefits of increased wind power deployment in the U.S. Wind Vision: A New Era for Wind Power in the United...continued→

If there was any doubt about the financial viability of environmentalism, a new report published by Advanced Energy Economy shows that energy entrepreneurs not only are making dramatic progress in developing clean fuel alternatives, but they also are making money...continued→

Another in NRDC's Year-End Series Reviewing 2014 Clean Energy Developments This year, the already good news about renewable energy in the United States got even better: Wind and solar power cost less than ever before and are being used...continued→

For New Yorkers like me, who’ve wanted to put solar panels on their roofs but found it wasn’t feasible, there’s some excellent news, thanks to an effort NRDC and others helped initiate at the New York State Public Service Commission...continued→

Here’s some exciting news from the number crunchers here at NRDC: Thanks especially to the plummeting costs of solar and wind power, states can cost-effectively cut much more carbon than the EPA originally proposed this June. As we wrote in...continued→

The price of an average U.S. home solar power system is about $20,000. (That’s before a 30 percent federal tax credit and any state, local and/or utility incentives.) If the price were to drop to $17,000, or even $16,000, would...continued→

Hot on the announcement of New York’s new K-Solar program, (read that: K Through Solar), which offers free advice to schools interested in going solar, there’s more good news that the movement to get solar on the nation’s 125,000 K-12...continued→

There’s some pretty happy-making news out in today from the federal government. The price of solar is down while installations continue to soar. There are more jobs building solar systems and more solar systems out there cleaning up our air....continued→

In his State of the Union address in January, President Obama gave a shout out to solar energy: “Every four minutes, another American home or business goes solar,” he said, “every panel pounded into place by a worker whose job...continued→

Power companies, facing pressure to find alternatives to fossil fuels like coal, often consider turning to biomass – an umbrella term for fuel that is newly derived from plant matter. Until recently, most people including policy makers assumed all biomass...continued→

The National Solar Schools Consortium launched yesterday at the opening of the widely-attended National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) Conference. Still in its infancy, the goal of the Consortium is to act as a unified voice for the growing solar schools...continued→

[Feb 14, 2014: updated to reflect initial reports from NARUC meeting] Utility executives and regulators from across the country met in Washington, D.C., this week for the winter meeting of National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners. As predicted there was...continued→

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Switchboard is the staff blog of the Natural Resources Defense Council, the nation’s most effective environmental group. For more about our work, including in-depth policy documents, action alerts and ways you can contribute, visit NRDC.org.